Australian Targets

Thursday, December 30, 2010

Caption: Long-term change in annual mean surface temperature anomalies over the globe. The bars indicate anomalies of surface temperature in each year. The blue line indicates five-year running mean, and the red line indicates a long-term linear trend. Anomalies are deviations from the normal (1971-2000 average).

2010 was hot. According to the Japan Meteorological Organisation (JMO) it was the second warmest year on record since 1891, when comprehensive data first started being kept.

In 2010 the JMO estimated the global average surface temperature anomaly was 0.36C, slightly lower than the 0.37C recorded in 1998 and the warmest year on record in the JMO data. The global temperature anomaly is based on the long term average temperature between 1971 and 2000.

The annual global average surface temperature has been rising at a rate of about 0.68°C per century. For 2010 the average temperature over land is expected to hit the warmest record.

According to the JMO the hottest ten years and the extent of their temperature anomalies were:

The JMO have published their preliminary findings based upon data from January to November - a complete analysis will be released in early February. A number of organisations track the global temperature record using slightly different methodologies, hence slight differences in their graphs and ranking of the warmest years. (Goddard Institute of Space Studies ranks 2005 as the warmest year on record)

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Time to leap out of the slowly boiling pot of earth's warming climate
into action on climate mitigation and adaption.
I don't want my children to ask why I didn't act after reading the
scientific reports of climate risks. I write on the
effects of human induced climate change, sea level rise, ocean
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A member of environmental NGOs and community groups for 30 years in Australia, currently living in Melbourne. I have been a Citizen journalist for the Indymedia network in Australia and worldwide from 2000, as an editor and contributor with Australia Indymedia and the global features collective. Since 2013 I have contributed many stories to Margot Kingston's citizen journalism website: nofibs.com.au. (See my article archive) I also post photoessays to Flickr and videos to Youtube and edit wikipedia as user Tirin. My website is takver.com where I can be contacted through the feedback form, the most reliable way to contact me. I can also be contacted through facebook and on twitter as @takvera.